Job design and poor individual performance are often blamed for the failure of work groups to achieve goals. It may be more likely that the structure does not enable their success.
To understand what I mean, think about the way many organisational structures are defined. Often, particularly in existing organisations, there is a group of people who are in a particular work unit. When restructuring, status quo tends to have a huge effect, and the work units tend to remain at least somewhat intact.
In itself that isn’t a problem, provided the structure was reasonable to begin with. If the organisational structure already meets the need, what are we trying to gain by changing it? Usually, restructures come about because the operations of an organisation no longer align with the structure.
It makes sense, then, that the best way to develop an ideal structure is to start at the start. Align the structure with the organisational objectives. Only then is it possible to begin determining what each individual job consists of. Doing it in reverse does nobody justice.